I wanna open my own shooting range, should I invest in setting up a trap/skeet field or nah?
My current plans are:
- 250m range for rifles (max my land allows)
- 100m range for pistol/rimfire/etc
- 25m indoor range
- archery field
- bbq/picnic area
- reload room
- high pressure compressor for air rifle people
Overall the most expensive thing will be building the bathroom/office building and earth moving to build the backstops.
around me the skeet/trap range brings more people than the rifle and pistol ranges.
I don't think it's very popular around here, at least most ranges are small 200m ranges for rifle and maybe with a separate 25/50m for pistols.
The info I received from the city council and later from the ministry of sports people is that for centerifre rifle I need a barrier of at least 8m in height made of either dirt or concrete, and no house or building behind it for 200m, but I won't really know until I submit the plans and get approval/rejected. About noise, the firing line will be 200m away from any house and that's supposedly enough.
>I don't think it's very popular around here
I suggest starting small then, maybe an informal trap or skeet range. Setting up a good shotgun range has high expenses for the target throwers, clays, and labor. If people are paying to use it, great. But if nobody is interested you're out a lot of money.
>About noise, the firing line will be 200m away from any house and that's supposedly enough.
I would hope that this is 200 meters of your own property, and that you aren't relying on other people not building anything on their property.
>I would hope that this is 200 meters of your own property, and that you aren't relying on other people not building anything on their property.
Ahem, behold my shitty private gun club
>random dude who doesn't care
That isn't the owner''s house? I've been to a few different private outdoor ranges across a few different states, and it was common for the owner to have a house pretty close to the range like that.
We don't really have an owner, we're ran by a board of elected members who lease the land from the dnr and handle everything else.
I used to shoot trap and skeet here before I moved. Of course this is in wisconsin, your milage may vary depending on your local and state laws
>Cheesehead continues to invent new and creative ways to interject Kwik Trip into everything
Midwestbros how do we save them?
>If only you knew how good things really are
No, you'll have enough on your plate already with all that. It'll be very time consuming to manage as-is, no need to make it even harder.
200m isn't far, even when there are trees around. From my own experience in europe (i guess you're from there given the unit system), whatever the city council says, neighborhood >>> range in the end.
Don't do the bare minimum, a wall won't do the trick alone to stop noises. Make sure to build an insonorized building of some sort to shoot rifles from. You absolutely can end up with endless lawsuits, restriction to fire x/y calibers, forced to open only at certain unpractical hours or mandatory suppressor use. Not many people from the authorities will take your side. I've seen it happen with enough ranges, even some existing since 50-100 years.
Opening a range is a risky business. Best of luck anon.
Yes. If you want to shoot pistols or rifles all you need to do is find land with a suitable safe backstop and set up your targets. So it's easily done on public or private land. But skeet, trap, 5-stand, and especially sporting clays requires expensive target throwers and a lot more effort for the course to be set up correctly. That's not very practical for someone to do on their own property and it's even harder on public land. Yeah you can buy cheap/basic clay pigeon throwers but they suck compared to the experience you get at a nice range.
There are safety concerns with eating/drinking while shooting (lead exposure) to consider, but if you can get away with it set up vending machines for drinks and snacks. Those kinds of things will sell like crazy and will help offset maintenance expenses. Offer earpro and targets as well, and if it's legally possible sell ammo too.
Here's a pic of my land. I inherited from my grandparents, my parents gave it to me in full and bought my uncle's share. In the notch to the left will be the rifle range, the rest of facilities to the middle and the rightmost third I'll rent to plant wheat or alfalfa and maybe build myself a house in the future.
The target throwers I'm seeing in Midway USA all start from around $1000 for the basic ones and I'll have to have several of them. Seems like a huge investment, maybe I'll consider it in the future. Sporting clays would be very expensive because you need a ton of land and many machines. With skeet you only need 2.
Vending machines are a possibility, as well as selling anything I can sell without licence. I could only sell ammo to club members.
Sadly I'll have to put tons of rules in place to stop morons from fricking the place up. No dumping, no shooting into the air, etc etc. Sad reality of things, nobody around here has Swiss-like discipline.
I might buy a basic (spring launcher) machine and see if anyone wants to shoot clays.
Hopefully public, I still need to form a club (separate entity form the range) for most things too. Club needs to be a non-profit to be recognized and allows me to set up the range. I have to read the law more, I think it even could grant me funds from the govt.
Too many ranges are sketch like that around here, the one I went didn't even have bathrooms of any kind and you had to pee behind the trees. I want to raise the standard a bit.
Noise is a huge factor, I plan on lining the perimeter of the range with trees and I'll also install baffle barriers. I'm in South America.
Well it doesn't look too bad op
Which country you are from?
He's from Chile
Skeet? Is that the thing where you pretend there's a drone flying by you and you have to snap shot it with a shotty? Yeah, def include one of those if you wanna be future proof.
i forgot to add my driveway is 500 yards btw
I love Skeet and sporting clays but you should be asking your customers and the locals, not us.
>backstop costs
That shouldn't be bad unless you don't have enough earth on the property and you have to have more trucked in, then it can be expensive real fast. But if there is enough earth on site it's amazing how fast berms can be built with the right machinery. Have you priced insurance yet?
>- 250m range for rifles (max my land allows)
You are factoring in noise and keeping shit from traveling outside your land, right?
Make sure to have a handful of completely ridiculous rules just to placate Fudds. They don't feel safe unless they're reminded to do something stupid.
public or private?
>Overall the most expensive thing will be building the bathroom/office building and earth moving to build the backstops.
you look up insurance yet and how any additional range offered and type may effect it?
>building the bathroom
forgot to mention my shitty 2 bit private club uses a porto shitter, gets the job done.
Yes, assuming it's outdoors. Trap/skeet is one of the most popular shooting sports. Half of your business will be from hunters and other sportsmen trying out, practicing with, and sighting in their new toy, and shotgun hunting is extremely popular as well. See if you can't get an agreement with local firearms sellers in your area to give a couple hours of range time with every firearm purchase, if they don't have a range themselves. I'd also see about an archery range if your county doesn't operate one at any local parks.
at this point he could've just posted his gps location